New Cromarty ferry to be built by SMS

SOUTHAMPTON Marine Services is keeping the city’s shipbuilding tradition alive with a £500,000 contract to build a car ferry.

It is a far cry from the luxury superyacht Mirabella V, which was the final ship constructed at VT’s Woolston shipyard, but the unnamed vessel for Scotland’s
Cromarty Ferry Company is the first to be built in the city from scratch since 2003.

Across the river from VT’s old yard at Ocean Quay, SMS work is already under way on the project, which will keep half the firm’s 21 workers busy for five months.

The new 17.25m by 6.5m vessel, which will carry four cars and up to 50 passengers, will operate across the entrance to the Cromarty Firth between Cromarty and Nigg.

It is the first fruit of SMS’ move from Hythe Marine Park into the heart of S o u t h a m p - ton, where it has also bought the workshop and fabrication facilities of H a n s o n Agg re gates
Marine at B u r n l e y Wharf. The firm started in January 2006 carrying out ship repairs but the Cromarty ferry is its first complete new build, something bosses hope will become a regular event.